Serenity 3rd in weekend take
POSTED BY: WildHeavenFarm
UPDATED: Wednesday, October 5, 2005 23:22
VIEWED: 11952
PAGE 2 of 3
Well, I for one don't have to see Flightplan after the local newscast spoiled the whole damn thing.
If you intend to see Flightplan, turn back now.
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There I was innocently watching the news when the talking head announced this:
It appears that nationwide, flight attendants are calling for a boycott of Flightplan.
Why? The Air Marshall and the senior Flight Attendent are the bad guys. They kidnapped Foster's character's kid to blackmail/ransom her back.
Being portrayed as terrorists doesn't seem to be the worst offense this movie commits. What has their panties in a real bunch is: Seems that the movie makers portray flight attendants as rude. I'm assuming that flight attendants have never actually flown as passengers, cause this is NOT a surprise to anyone who has flown.
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Huh. I'm not sure what airlines you're flying, Knibblet, but I'd try a different one. My experiences on Continental have all been good, and Delta & SouthWest flight attendants qualify in my book as downright friendly.
I think the numbers would be better if Serenity had been a better movie. Unfortunately, I didn't feel the story had the same level of cohesion and drama that the series pilot had, nor did it flow as well. The explosions were definitely higher-budget, and everything was shinier, but the various threads of the film just didn't mesh as well as they did in the pilot. *shrug* If I was a film critic, I could probably describe my disappointment better, but that's all I can give you.
Still ... I did go see it twice. *smiles* And I'm really looking forward to a director's cut on DVD! I think the movie might work better with an extra 20 minutes of drama.
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Jasonzzz wrote:
"Wouldn't bet on Universal doing anymore ads than what they've done... "
That would be my bet also. Putting aside their grassroots ideas, Universal has an enormously busy month.
Oct 7 - Two For the Money
Oct 21 - Doom
Oct 28 - Prime
Had Serenity opened at $20-25 million, Universal likely would have chimed in with their "#1 movie in America" ads this week. But with only a $10 million take, they are likely to turn all attentions this week to "Two For the Money". And after that, to "Doom".
Barring an extremely abnormal rise in box office, or an unexpectedly slow decline, it looks like the final US Box Office will be in the $25 million range. That'll leave a hefty $55 million for the international box office to carry if that $80 million is to be had.
Now, having said that, DVD sales certainly have changed the way that a movie is viewed success vs failure. And I still say that this film's giant X-Factor is Wonder Woman. If that makes $200 million, Joss will make whatever he wants to next.
So, this fan base has done the impossible before. I wouldn't past us doing it again. But the first weekend numbers were, to me, pretty disappointing.
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Quote:
Originally posted by nxojkt:
Now, having said that, DVD sales certainly have changed the way that a movie is viewed success vs failure.
Exactly. I'd like to point out that The Bourne Identity wasn't a smash hit at the box office, but it caught fire on DVD. Its studio has said that without the huge DVD sales and rentals that the movie made, The Bourne Supremacy would never have been greenlit. So sometimes the DVD revenue really has a draw. There's a good chance that this will be a big factor this year especially, seeing as how box office intake is down so dramatically overall.
That said, I'm disappointed in Serenity's grosses as well. I was hoping for higher. If anything, this might be the push to get the rabid Browncoats back in the theater again this weekend. A strong second weekend is always a good thing.
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Quote:
Originally posted by nxojkt:
And I still say that this film's giant X-Factor is Wonder Woman. If that makes $200 million, Joss will make whatever he wants to next.
Thanks for bringing this point up. One thing we will always have going for us is that Joss loves this 'verse as much, if not more, than we do. If things go well for him, things will go well for us.
~~~~~~~~~~~~
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To be clear the History of Violence was in a super limited release last week so really this week is it's first week.
Also, there's no rationalizing the level of bad movies that people are increasingily willing to go see--case in point, Out of the Blue. Hmm, looks ridiculously stupid, most of the action is underwater without dialogue, and almost every reviewer that's been willing to see it says that it sucks. Look how many fricking people went out of their way to see that versus Serenity or even the few movies that are out that would qualify as well made movies (History of Violence being the highest one on the list). I mean Flightplan--come on from the first promo it just looks ridiculous and requiring a crazy number of miraculous coincidences to work. Sorry, the human race is definitely getting dumber.
Browncoat Monk
Ain't no place I can be since I found Serenity...
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So, at the end of it, I guess since this was suppose to be a grassroots campaign - and if we can all agree (even Ebert and most of the critics) that it's a great to fantastic movie, then ultimately, we (collectively) are at fault... The double-edge sword problem with these grassroots campaign is that it is pretty much completely dependent on the active grassroots. I don't know, maybe the Universal marketing department betted wrong, maybe they "didn't know how to start a grassroot campaign", maybe the artificial nature of the "grassroot campaign" turned some people off...
whatever it is, there's still have a chance of hitting $80mil *if* DVD sales are a part of it.
Quote:
Originally posted by nxojkt:
Jasonzzz wrote:
"Wouldn't bet on Universal doing anymore ads than what they've done... "
That would be my bet also. Putting aside their grassroots ideas, Universal has an enormously busy month.
Oct 7 - Two For the Money
Oct 21 - Doom
Oct 28 - Prime
Had Serenity opened at $20-25 million, Universal likely would have chimed in with their "#1 movie in America" ads this week. But with only a $10 million take, they are likely to turn all attentions this week to "Two For the Money". And after that, to "Doom".
Barring an extremely abnormal rise in box office, or an unexpectedly slow decline, it looks like the final US Box Office will be in the $25 million range. That'll leave a hefty $55 million for the international box office to carry if that $80 million is to be had.
Now, having said that, DVD sales certainly have changed the way that a movie is viewed success vs failure. And I still say that this film's giant X-Factor is Wonder Woman. If that makes $200 million, Joss will make whatever he wants to next.
So, this fan base has done the impossible before. I wouldn't past us doing it again. But the first weekend numbers were, to me, pretty disappointing.
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Quote:
Originally posted by eep:Quote:
Originally posted by nxojkt:
Now, having said that, DVD sales certainly have changed the way that a movie is viewed success vs failure.
Exactly. I'd like to point out that The Bourne Identity wasn't a smash hit at the box office, but it caught fire on DVD. Its studio has said that without the huge DVD sales and rentals that the movie made, The Bourne Supremacy would never have been greenlit. So sometimes the DVD revenue really has a draw. There's a good chance that this will be a big factor this year especially, seeing as how box office intake is down so dramatically overall.
Even more dramatic than The Bourne Identity is Austin Powers. The first of those movies made a whopping $67 million worldwide. DVD made that movie a hit, and there were enormously succesfull sequels. Pitch Black made only $53 million worldwide, but the the rising star of Vin Deisel got a sequel. So it's still possible.
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Although it’s true box office take is down in general and Serenity didn’t do as well as we’d wished, I hope people don’t just forget the box office and start talking DVDs. It’s true that DVD sales will probably play an important role, but we shouldn’t bank on them this early in the game. The first weekend is over and already we’re talking about how the film can be saved by DVD? Give it some time, folks!
Right now, we still need to be concentrating on getting people in the theaters, for three reasons. The first, obviously, is so that they’ll add to the box office. The second is so that they spread word of mouth, because the best advertisement for the film is the film itself (“I just saw this great movie, Serenity! You HAVE to go see it!”). And thirdly, more people in the theaters means more customers when the DVD is out--every ticket sold (more or less) is a double buy; movie now and then DVD later. And we Browncoats have to turn out again this second weekend, to help keep the drop off from being significant. If the film has lower than average drop-off, it will be kept on more screens longer and thus have more time to rake in money and make converts through word of mouth.
To put it in perspective, we made back a quarter of the budget in the first three days. We have enormous critical acclaim. And, according to Uni’s statistics, 60% of those folks who went to see it last weekend were non-fans. This second weekend is probably more important than the first, and we’re going in with critical acclaim and a whole host of newbies who’ve just seen one of the best films of the year (though some ads with quotes from the aforementioned critics wouldn’t hurt, eh Uni?). Talk up the film (I recommend emphasizing its sheer quality and only revealing your fannishness if they seem to know something about it and want details, because the quality of the film is what a non-fan can truly appreciate), go see it again (preferably multiple times), post more guerrilla marketing if you can, and let’s see how it does. DVDs are going to help us a lot, but right now our focus should still be on the theaters. We’ve barely been out a week, we met Universal’s expectations last weekend, and the non-fans outnumbered the fans in the theater--we haven’t “failed” at the box office yet, we just need time to grow and we’ll get that time if we have a decent second weekend. So get back in line! The theater line, that is.
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